Name: Julian Silver

Social Justice Group: 2022-2023, Access, Equity and Inequity in Youth Sports

Date of Fieldwork: February 15, 2023

Name of Organization and person (people) with whom you met and their title(s):David Raimer

Type of Fieldwork: Interview

What I did and what I learned about my topic, activism, social justice work or civil and human rights work from this fieldwork?:

On February 15th me and my group interviewed Coach David Raimer who works at basketball city and is the director of the youth sports programs. He is also the camp manager, and does personal training with kids across the city. He has been playing sports his whole life. He started with tennis and volleyball, but because of his height, he was persuaded into playing basketball. Instantly, he fell in love with teaching other kids, and knew that’s what he wanted to do. He started working at basketball city in 1998 and has grown his program a vast amount. He offers many free programs to kids, and free summer camp to kids who live in the same area as basketball city. He lets public schools use his facility for gym class if they don’t have access to a gym at their school. He also hosts tournaments for AAU (authentic athletic union) teams across the city, including big tournaments like 55’ swish, and rumble in the Bronx.

I really enjoyed this interview and we got really good information. My favorite part was hearing his favorite part of working at basketball city. This was seeing his former campers and students growing up to be pro players, or agents, or pilots for NBA teams. I thought it was really cool how he keeps in touch with people he used to coach.